


When the Light Turns into Darkness

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Foreigner Series - C. J. Cherryh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-20
Updated: 2007-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-25 05:27:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1633904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bren and Barb go to a party, before anything happens. Pre-series, and very definitely holiday-fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Light Turns into Darkness

**Author's Note:**

> I only knew the first third of so of canon, but thank you to everyone who proofread, especially faded-lilac. Title by Goldfrapp. 
> 
> Written for qwerty

 

 

Bren checks his watch, lifting an eyebrow at the late hour, and immediately feels bad about how obvious all that was. Well, it is late, especially since they have to drive quite far out to get to the party, and Barb is still not ready. Bren figures that she's probably convinced that it's positively early, just the time to be doing her make-up and going out to the first party of the evening. The fact that the first party of the evening is going to be stuffed with tedious pleasantries, and narrow-minded bureaucrats doesn't diminish her enjoyment of it at all, Bren supposes. At least he'll have someone to grin at, when the Deputy Assistant Undersecretary for Administrative Affairs starts rambling.

"Come on, Barb. They're politicians and academics. They have to be at home by eleven, drinking warm milk, otherwise they'd become interesting." Calling through the door, Bren adjusts the cuffs of his suit again, to stop it from looking quite as old as it is. Black might never look bad, but he was pretty sure that the awkward cut of the coat looked pretty terrible. At least his trousers aren't too short, even if he hasn't quite managed to get them uncreased.

"Yes, yes, but that doesn't mean I have to look like the rest of them. I promise, just a moment!" Barb's voice filters through the air, and Bren sets to smoothing out the wrinkles in his sleeves. The best he can hope for in formal wear is looking like an underfed penguin, albeit a clothed one. Compounded with an academic's pay, he's sure that the suit he was wearing was at least two decades out of date, and had probably never been fashionable. At least he'll match with the senior faculty, and maybe they'd stop joking about how he was a young whippersnapper? Unlikely, but Bren figures if he has to wear the ugly thing, he might as well derive some psychic enjoyment from the whole experience.

Bren moves his hand to knock, again, when Barb opens it.

"I'm rendered almost speechless. Any remarks I made about how long it took to get that dress, and to get prepared, I take them back completely, and request that you ignore any ideas like that." Stumbling over his tongue, Bren tries to compose a suitably flattering compliment. Or even a devastatingly flattering one. Barb's dress has a wide neck, and simply skims down her curves; the bright red colour is flattering to her currently-blonde hair.

"You like it?" In the narrow hall outside of her bedroom, Barb smiles, in the sort of shy, yet absolutely aware way that she has which is always alluring and strangely engaging. The light from the downstairs chandelier casts long shadows, and leaves Barb half in darkness, so she looks more like an old painting than a flesh-and-blood woman. Reaching out, Bren traces the shell of her ear, spray-stiff curls rasping at his knuckles, and the cool weight of her long earrings against his palm.

"Absolutely." Bren kisses her, smiling against the glossy lipstick Barb has just finished up, and is sure to keep retouching all night.

She curls an arm over his shoulder, and momentarily deepens the kiss. "Ack! Bren, we really do have to go. Are you ready to face the Roommates of Judgment?" Breaking away, Barb hurries down the stairs, and waves a quick goodbye to the other students who live in the house, while buttoning up her coat, and slipping on a scarf and gloves. Bren only catches a quick glance of the sullenly disapproving faces of the three other women who live there, as he swings the door shut, letting the cold air rush inside his own, unbuttoned coat.

Barb laughs, as she slips into the car. "Oh, their faces! I'm so sorry that they still don't like you. It's just that I mentioned that you were still doing studies for a government job, and well, Shauna really doesn't like all the money that goes into bureaucracy, and she's got Joy and Dana over on her side. They're so insistent that you're personally responsible for everything that's wrong, right up to the cold. Joy tried to convince me that you sabotaged the trains two days ago, by making it snow."

Bren just shakes his head, as they drive along. He likes driving, even if it's usually impractical, but the administration's holiday party is all the way out on one of the new Western developments, and there isn't really another way to get there; he's certainly not going to make Barb come along for three bus interchanges.

He asks, "Can they really think that? Barb, did you ask for crazy roommates, or were you just so lucky to have chosen these three?" She laughs, and waves a hand to dismiss the idea.

"Come on, the Room of Judgment isn't so bad. They're just students, it's not like even Shauna can even do anything really awful. Now, stop worrying about them. We can stay over your place, right?"

Bren chuckles a little. "You think we'll be able to keep our hands off each other long enough to get through the whole party?"

Barb smacks the side of the seat, near Bren's shoulder. "Really! I thought you'd be so well-mannered. Nice academic boy, and all I get is bad innuendo." She's smiling broadly, and almost seems to shine, a pinprick of light against the vast wintry darkness.

Bren takes a curve a little sharply, and can feel the unconscious tension in Barb's hand, the slight dig of her fingernails into his thigh. It's been foggy all day, but it's heavier than usual, and Bren's paying careful attention to the route, and between the road-lights, and Barb's hand, he feels pleasantly anchored, like there's nothing else in the world except for this.

The rest of the drive is mostly quiet; the radio plays a soft mixture of a piano concerto and news updates, fading in and out, as they get further away from the transmission towers on the Eastern half of Mospheira.

When they finally arrive at the house, the comfortable silence is broken by the rumble of gravel and ice on the road. Bren shifts down, and pulls the car into park, and lets out a loose breath. It was more difficult than he thought it would be, all of those winding roads and dark passes, under the newly-fallen snow. "Are you ready to go stun them all, Barb?" He gets out of the car, meaning to unlock her door, but before he's even halfway around, Barb's out, and tucking the ends of her scarf into her coat's collar.

"It's so cold out here. I can hardly believe this is actually a vacation spot." Bren leans over, and kisses her cheek. "But, I can stun them. Possibly with my ice-cold touch." Reaching out a gloved hand, Barb pokes Bren's forearm.

Bren laughs, feeling the crunch of snow under his boots. "You're going to have to hide out, once we get there. It's just unfair to keep doing this to my poor colleagues; you'll give them a terrible shock."

"At least you'll get a decent position, then. I can't believe you're still working for that paidhi thing. Do you really want to go over and have to live like Wilson? On the radio last week, they are talking about him, and it was so weird; I think he might be totally cracked." Barb notices the way Bren has slowly been tensing, and in a flurry of hand gestures, tries to calm him. "I don't think you'd go crazy, honey, it's just that you'd be so far away, and what if something happened? Remember last fall when Toby had that nasty bug, and your mother was so worried? If there was any trouble, she'd try to go and get you, and I don't think anyone wants her camped out in front of the State Department."

Bren sighs; he's had this argument with Barb before, although it was rapidly becoming less of an argument, and more of a constant conversation. "Barb, Wilson's not going to quit at it for a long time: I can't imagine he'll go out of that office any way other than feet-first. And you can't say that it isn't a very good opportunity to do work on linguistics; I know it bores you, but some of the older faculty would give up on all their other work to work exclusively on this. Shawn and I are doing exciting things with the translation matrix, you know that, but it's a good dream to have, to be able to do completely new work, a new linguistic puzzle every day. It's just not enough, even if I can finish the crossword really fast, here."

Barb starts walking again, and Bren follows. "Really, Barb, don't worry about this. Wilson might be a little odd, but he's in good health, and the next time they need to send paidhi over might be when our grandchildren are growing up. Don't worry about it, just try not to drive any of the professors' wives too crazy with jealously, alright? Shawn says he's seriously considering going back to women, now."

Barb smiles, and Bren feels a little better. "We'll have to talk about that, later, alright? But as long as I get to harass Hunter, this shouldn't be so bad." Her smile is positively vindictive, and Bren hopes that Shawn will forgive him.

As they come to the door, Bren rings the bell, and then stands back, linking arms with Barb. She smiles at him, and then the door opens.

"Oh, Mister Cameron! And this is your date, Miss Letterman? I'll let Professor Hanks know that you've arrived."

 


End file.
